WR: September 5 – September 11

The Start of The Journey

ISM is a unique class. Out of every class I have taken, from U.S. History to Health Science 2, this is probably the most practical class I have ever taken. It puts my learning to use, and if I don’t put in an active effort to learn from Mr. Wysong, I know I’ll be tasting the dust of all my peers who are in my class. I may not be going out to the real world, but this week I have learned plenty that will help me out when going on interviews or when simply trying to have a nice appearance. I am truly overjoyed to have made it into ISM, and I am willing to put in every piece of effort I can contribute to this class and more to reach my goal of becoming a surgeon.

I have always been told that my appearance matters because it creates a good first impression; however, nobody has ever bothered to tell me how to look better. I understand that certain clothes and colors go with each other, but how exactly would I know what look suits me? However, I quickly learned from Wysong some keys to looking nice: shoe and belt matches in color, socks are long and black, the suit should not be too big for the wearer, and the suit should not be a casual type that one would wear to a party, for example, a dark navy blue coat with two gold buttons on the bottom. According to Mr. Wysong, these buttons show, to a certain extent, how unprofessional one is because the buttons distract the audience and look somewhat casual. However, I gained another important piece of knowledge that I had not known before about dressing properly. As a somewhat average male with an average height of 5’8, I want to look taller. The way to accomplish this goal is by wearing vertical striped shirts because it gives the appearance that one is taller than he normally is. While a nice appearance may be important to get a good first impression, we also learned very good ways to keep up that impression throughout a conversation or interview.

One of the first things that people hate when talking to others is not maintaining eye contact. There is a very small safe zone (get it ‘Saif’ zone) between staring down the target audience, which gives the feeling of intimidation, and not looking much at all, which obviously give the feeling of weakness. When talking to someone, one shouldn’t arbitrarily look around, but instead, they should try to remain eye contact with at least the bridge of the nose. Looking off in other directions relates to some psychological parts of the mind and people are more likely to believe your answers are less insincere if you don’t look at them. Another thing is that one should ALWAYS smile. There is power in a smile and therefore, it is bad to see a neutral or even negative expression on one’s face when talking to one. Smiling is one of the biggest aspects of body language and there is no way that someone such as an interviewer or leader could not read body language. Even without that reason, smiling for one’s self takes effect even on the wearer of the smile. Just by wearing a smile, the environment feels more positive around one, and others in the environment are more likely to act nicely and talk to one.

I have tried out these techniques in real life, and from personal experience, they work. As I have stated, no other class has shown me tangible and practical results so quickly. I cannot express in words how happy I am to be in ISM. I have great expectations for myself and this class.